


Restless.

by orphan_account



Category: The Avengers (2012)
Genre: M/M, almost fluffy, pre-slash without the weird underage implications?
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-07-29
Updated: 2012-07-29
Packaged: 2017-11-10 23:12:16
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,100
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/471778
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Bruce can't sleep, but he's not the only one awake.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Restless.

Bruce is watching the news at 4 o’ clock am. He has his tea and a blanket. It’s one of those nights like when he was younger and at his aunt and uncle’s house unable to sleep. Neither of them ever nagged him when he couldn’t sleep, but neither of them ever stayed up, either. Usually they’d tell him to get a glass of milk and to at least try to sleep. But he knew he wouldn’t, and though the next day bags were under his eyes he never complained about his insomnia.

Never liked to worry people. Now he doesn’t even have to try. He laughs soundlessly at his thoughts and turns the channel. Nothing is on interests him. Not that he expected anything to; it’s more to pass the time without disturbing anyone. He taps his fingers on his bare chest. It’s kind of hot tonight, but it doesn’t feel like a sleepless night if he doesn’t have at least a light blanket over his legs and a mug in his hands. Underneath the blanket he’s completely bare. Being in tropical places made him pick up the habit, and now he never feels quite comfortable when he can’t hear the husky sound of his legs rubbing together.

“Hey.” The voice startles Bruce enough for him to reflexively change the channel, even though he wasn’t watching anything more incriminating than a Discovery documentary. He pulls the blanket up a little, too.

Tony takes a seat on the other end of the couch, his tumbler in hand (gin? whiskey?), a silk robe loosely tied around his middle. It’s falling off his shoulders. Bruce wants to look somewhere else but he can’t so much as blink his eyes. Beyond Tony being attractive, in Bruce’s hazy half-sleep state Tony is completely surreal, like a liquor-drinking angel or ghost, leaving him transfixed. A commercial has to come on before Bruce realizes he hasn’t said anything to him.

“Hey.” Bruce guesses he should say something else. “Can’t sleep?”

Tony’s lips purse around the rim of his glass. “No, I’m fast asleep, Bruce. Dreaming about what the world would be like if there would ten of me. Which is to say, deliriously awesome.” There’s a sardonic bite to his tone that doesn’t match what he’s saying at all. Idly Bruce wonders how many times he’s filled his glass.

Bruce laughs and rubs his hands over his face. “Yeah, sorry. Okay, better question: why are you up?”

“Same reason you are. Sleeping wasn’t in the cards. Cards are bullshit, so I guess it’s insomnia.” He grins at Bruce and Bruce gives him a weak smile back.

For a while there’s no sound but the shuffle of limbs as Tony puts his feet up on the coffee table. Both of them stare at the tv, a theoretical projection of the Big Bang, nebulas and stars and gas clouds bursting into life on the screen. The Hulk can survive in a vacuum, Bruce thinks. Iron Man can’t yet, but they’re working on that now. So far they’ve been unable to project the suit’s thrusters past the atmospheric barrier, but he has no trouble believing they could figure it out with a little more effort. Bruce scratches at his chest again, and looks over at Tony, who is already looking at him.

Tony is there but not there, and it’s strangely like they’re both alone on the same couch. He can easily see Tony being the same child he was in his aunt and uncle’s house; never sleeping, never chastised. He imagines smaller hands around a glass of milk he made himself and the image fits. But now his fingers are wrapped tight around a glass of gin instead. He shivers a little, and the ice tinkles on the side of his tumbler.

“Are you cold?” Bruce asks, already sidling up closer to him. Carefully, without pulling the blanket off of his naked self, he drapes it over Tony, too. Their legs slide against each other. No layers. He doesn’t want to fix it, really, and Tony hasn’t said anything, so he guesses this is okay. “Uh.” Bruce looks down, and crinkles the blanket in his palms. “I thought you’d be with Pepper.”

“She kicked me out of her room.” Bruce looks startled, which makes Tony laugh. “For once it wasn’t a fight. She just has to get up early, you know. Apparently I can’t stay still.” Bruce notices that, too, especially with Tony’s leg bouncing against his and making that husky skin-on-skin sound. “Are you even wearing boxers? Your legs are hairy as fuck.”

Bruce laughs and shakes his head, though his cheeks have gotten a little hot. “Thought I was the only one up. Anyway, me and clothes don’t have a conciliatory history.”

Tony huffs a laugh into his glass and downs the rest of the thing. It must be strong if Tony Stark is hissing through his teeth. “This—“ he points around himself with glass in hand, ”is kinda gay. I mean, not too gay. Yet. But pretty gay, I mean. We’re cuddled practically naked under a blanket watching Discovery Channel.”

Bruce shifts sort of uncomfortably and hides his smile by biting his lip and turning away. Now seems like the time to push the blanket down between their legs so they don’t touch. Tony actually looks offended. “Wow, no, I wasn’t saying it was a bad thing. You’re like a goddamn heater and I’m cold quit this shy shit and get back here.”

Tony pops the blanket up and throws his legs over Bruce’s lap. To his surprise they are actually freezing cold and this doesn’t seem to be some sort of test on his patience. Bruce can’t keep his arms suspended in the air forever, so he settles them on top of Tony’s shins, and Tony stretches up like a cat and purrs lazily. He starts massaging them gently, thumbs into muscle groups, feeling the knots give way.

Within seconds Tony is asleep. Bruce gradually pulls the tumbler out of his hand and sets it on the coffee table, and covers him up better with the blanket. When Tony’s head flops to the side, hair falls in his eyes, making him kick in his sleep. Bruce smiles and pushes it out of the way for him, meticulously tucking it behind his ear before settling back in the couch.

He doesn’t sleep. Not immediately. Instead he watches the rise and fall of Tony’s chest until his eyelids feel heavy, and he drifts off thinking about how different it is to be restless with someone else.


End file.
